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New cabover, engines for Peterbilt

A new cabover medium-duty truck, the Model 220, will join the family of trucks built by Peterbilt Motors Co. in mid-2007, along with two new mid-range engine models built by Cummins Engine Co. exclusively for Peterbilt’s parent company, Paccar, with those engines being badged with a ‘Paccar’ nameplate

A new cabover medium-duty truck, the Model 220, will join the family of trucks built by Peterbilt Motors Co. in mid-2007, along with two new mid-range engine models built by Cummins Engine Co. exclusively for Peterbilt’s parent company, Paccar, with those engines being badged with a ‘Paccar’ nameplate.

At a press conference held at Peterbilt’s headquarters in Denton, TX, Peterbilt’s gm Dan Sobic said the reason the company is re-introducing a cabover medium-duty model is to give its 223 dealers more “breadth of product” to meet the needs of its customer base.

“We’ve seen a big market shift in medium duty over the last 10 years,” Sobic said. “In 1996, Class 7 trucks outnumbered their Class 6 brethren by eight to one. In 2006, that ratio is one-to-one. It’s a market that buys 100,000 units a year and doesn’t experience the cyclicality of the Class 8 business so we felt the time was right to increase our heavier medium-duty offerings.”

The Model 220 will initially be available in a Class 7 configuration, followed by a Class 6 model in late 2007 or 2008. Overall production will be limited to 100 cabovers a year.

The Model 220 is based on the popular European medium-duty cabover built by Paccar subsidiary DAF in England. DAF will initially build and then ship complete units from England to the U.S., he said.

Paccar is also rolling out two midrange engines, the PX-8 and PX-6, built exclusively for the OEM by Cummins for use in medium-duty straight truck and tractor models, Sobic said.

“These engines grew out of a longstanding partnership we’ve had with Cummins through DAF,” he said. “We found that medium-duty customers don’t care what brand of engine powers their vehicle as much as Class 8 customers.”

Sobic added that Paccar plans to stay within the mid-range product line and not expand into the heavier over-the-road 11 and 13 liter engine segments as the company has what he calls a “great working relationship” with its primary heavy-duty engine suppliers, Caterpillar and Cummins.